Page:Poems Henderson.djvu/64

Spent its sorrow by the rootlets,
 Of thy waving blades of green.
Such a play-ground as the meadow,
 No other child-life oft hath seen.

For nowhere in all the woodland,
 When the blue-bird piped her note,
And the birchen buds were swelling,
 And the maple's nectar flowed.
Grew such-tinted anemones,
 As in thy growth of hazel glowed,
Not in any nurtured garden,
 Grew such violets as bloomed,
Mottled, white, and purple hearted,
 Round thy springy marshes edge.

There the grape vine's curling tendrils,
 Crept o'er thy grassy corner's space,
And I knew where richest clusters,
 'Neath its circled leaves found place.
Oh! dear old lowland meadow,
 Thou wert my kingdom, I your queen,
Untold mines of childish treasures,
 Hid within your wealth of green.

There the birdnest in the bushes,
 Hid I from all prying eyes,
On the flat rock in the sunshine,
 Oft I found the speckled prize,
Of the whippoorwill, whose music,
 Plaintive sweet fell on my ear,